Credibility of news content in the age of fake news: The case of Madrid Community

Abstract

| This research explores the attitudes toward news consumption to determine the elements that constitute the credibility of news and to understand the reasons that explain the degree oftrustin news from the media andonline news from other sources. Four mixeddiscussion groups were held, with parity between men andwomen, withan average socioeconomic structure, residents oftheAutonomous Community ofMadrid, andfrequent Internet users. According to the findings, trust in a media is the main factor in assessing whether a news item is credible. The participants were aware of the existence of fake news on the Internet, which they consider intentional, and which they mainly locate on social networks. It also appears that distrust of the news is fought by contrasting information in various media, which favors a diverse informational regime.